


where do we begin, the rubble or our sins?

by knox (booyouwhoran)



Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Episode VII: The Force Awakens (2015)
Genre: M/M, except it's Hux's, redemption arc, very liberal interpretation of the force
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-04-21
Updated: 2016-04-21
Packaged: 2018-06-03 14:25:14
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,801
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6614143
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/booyouwhoran/pseuds/knox
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>It's a terrible thing, loving a puppet</p>
            </blockquote>





	where do we begin, the rubble or our sins?

**Author's Note:**

> So there's a heap of really interesting Hux redemption meta floating around the kylux tag and I decided to take a crack at it ¯\\_(ツ)_/¯. 
> 
> My interpretation of the Force is very liberal (Light and Dark Force bonds?) so take this as fair warning. 
> 
> Title from Pompeii by Bastille, as this lyric seems very apt for these two.

He falls asleep every night to the sound of an entire system screaming for mercy, a mercy he refuses.

 

Hux is not well acquainted with empathy, has always associated it with weakness. Hux is not good or kind or merciful and he despises the tendrils of pain that curl around his thoughts when he tries to surrender to the dark of night. But his hate is not enough to silence their begging and pleas.

 

So he gets on his knees and begs instead, to a different kind of darkness.

 

One night, in the dull red glow of Ren’s quarters, he asks him whether he ever hears the screams.

 

“From the Hosnian System? I heard them, yes.” Ren looks puzzled, and he has right to. Most of their dalliances end in warm silence, curled up together in one of their beds. To speak would be to acknowledge that their situation perhaps isn’t normal for co-commanders of a galactic military organisation.

 

“No, do you still hear them? At night?” Hux whispers, annoyed at himself for how weak he sounds. Ren frowns at him. “No. Why would I?” and Hux rolls over and tries to sleep.

 

The collapse of Starkiller is a blow to both the First Order and him personally, of course. However, as he is piloted away from the crumbling pieces of his legacy with Kylo Ren bleeding all over his greatcoat, Hux can’t help but feel an odd sort of penance. If he believed in a cosmic karma, he may have seen it as some sort of payback. _You destroy us, you will be destroyed in turn._ General Hux is not a superstitious man but on that shuttle he thinks he hears the whisper of a thousand voices, no longer begging, but jeering.

 

Perhaps, a small corner of his mind suggests, he deserves this.

 

One does not become the General of the First Order, creator of a super weapon capable of destroying entire systems, if one is inclined towards guilt. Hux cannot count the number of heads he has stepped on to get to his position, and he doesn’t regret it in the slightest. He has always felt in his rightful place at the helm of the Finalizer, overseeing a reconstruction of the universe as they know it.

 

Destroying the Hosnian system was, in theory as simple as pushing a button. Of course, in reality it was five years of Hux’s blood, sweat and tears. Starkiller base was a part of him in some odd, indescribable way. Hux had come to think of it affectionately as _his_ , had once thought, somewhat ridiculously, that this is what mothers must feel when they hold their babes.

 

Now, lying in cold sheets where Ren left him to go meditate an hour ago, Hux hears the voices laughing at him and he is almost inclined to join them.

 

He can’t help but blame Ren, at least a little. Before their little tryst, Hux could focus solely on the small sphere of his own self-interest. The thing with Ren was intended to be a stress relief, a way of taking out their mutual frustrations without destroying the Finalizer. This was, of course, before Hux found himself scrambling through the snow on a burning planet looking for Ren. At first, he thinks the dark figure bleeding out in the snow is dead and the loss of Starkiller suddenly becomes minute in the light of this new, devastating observation.

 

Or course, Ren is not dead. In fact, he manages to contort his bloody features in a smirk (Hux is oddly pleased that the dreadful mask seems to be lost) and looks up at Hux through dark eyelashes.

 

“Looks like we both fucked up, then.”

 

Hux rolls his eyes. “If we’re being technical, Ren, it’s probably your fault that the Resistance were able to disable the weapon,” putting as much disdain into the insult as he can muster while his heart beats in a frantic pace of _I’mgladyou’reokayI’llkeepyousafeI’mgladyou’renotdead_.

 

Unfortunately, it appears as though Ren is in tune with Hux’s ridiculous sense of relief as he allows the other man to drag him slowly through the snow without a word of complaint. Hux lets himself think that Ren has a concussion as opposed to the far more horrifying notion that Ren is attempting to be _kind_ to him.

 

When they are seated in the rescue shuttle, Ren passed out on Hux’s coat (and perhaps it’s just because it has been a tremendously long day, but Hux doesn’t even feel a flicker of irritation about the expense of laundering it) is when he first hears it. Not the echoes of the Hosnian system, but instead a sort of…feedback from Ren. It is not unlike the few times Ren has entered his mind, but it feels softer, unintentional almost. It’s a gentle loop of _scavengerfailurepainRey?painfailureHuxsafeFather._ That last phrase is accompanied by an odd sort of painful, empty feeling that makes Hux shiver unhappily. He supposes that Ren is projecting in his weakened state, though none of the other crew seem affected. The small group of troopers have been permitted to take off their helmets. One, a soft looking girl with dark eyes, is crying softly. No one has the energy to tell her off.

 

In fact, Hux feels oddly inclined to join her.

 

It is only back at the Finalizer when the nightmares get worse. He still hears the screaming, feels the cloying taste of guilt unfamiliar and thick in his throat. Occasionally, he dreams he is a small child in the market with his mother when a bright red beam of light sears through the sky. In his dream, he thinks at first it’s a firework until he hears his mother scream and turns to see her flesh melting away until all that’s left is a pile of ash and the pearl necklace he remembers she used to wear to First Order dinners. He never dies in these dreams, though. Since Starkiller, they shift until he’s standing on a collapsing planet, light saber crackling ominously.

 

His opponent changes, though it always begins with the scavenger. She changes into FN-2187, the traitor, who turns into the person Hux recognises as General Leia Organa. Ren’s mother. The image keeps shifting – Hux sees his own father at one point, who rapidly changes into Supreme Leader Snoke, who changes into a group of scared looking children brandishing weapons. This one always feels the worst, Hux has come to realise. Sometimes, he can wake up at this point, drenched in sweat and shaking. More often than not, the image shifts into more faces Hux doesn’t recognise – an old Jedi with a blue saber, what looks like a Wookie – and some he does – a boy from the Academy he once kissed and then, scared, publicly rejected in front of their entire class. The final opponent is always a group of different species that Hux has never seen before. Some are crying, others clutch their children in silent, doomed acceptance. Hux knows that these are the people of the Hosnian system. He wakes choked by unsaid, unfamiliar emotions, ones he is never quite sure how to respond to. Usually, he goes to Ren’s room.

 

Hux isn’t an idiot, and while he understands the Force only through the few holorecords he’s been able to access, he is aware that these new dreams have something to do with Ren. On one of these nights, when he wakes with the image of Han Solo caressing his face in a way his own father would never dream of burned into his retinas, he remembers with a strange sort of amusement one of the first conversations he and Ren ever had.

 

It was a few weeks after Ren had boarded the Finalizer. At this point, Hux had little to do with him and it was the conversation that sparked almost a year of mutual loathing. He had been on the bridge, overseeing the movement of some supplies for Starkiller when Ren had loudly barged over, interrupting Hux’s conversation with Mitaka about a particular model of screw required.

 

“General, I require the use of four legions of troopers immediately.”

 

Hux had been a little amused by Ren’s demand.

 

“I’m afraid that won’t be possible, Lord Ren. Currently all troopers are assisting in the building of Supreme Leader’s super weapon. You will have to wait for another three days before a legion becomes available.”

 

Ren stepped closer to him, trying to intimidate. It certainly worked on Mitaka, who had scuttled off somewhere under pretence of work.

 

“I need those troopers _now_ , General. We have new information regarding the presence of a map leading to one of the First Order’s enemies. I suggest for your sake you find me my required troopers.”

 

His mask radiated a self satisfied aura that Hux despised. Sizing himself up, he took a step towards Ren until they were (Hux assumed, it was hard to tell through the mask) eye to eye.

 

“Look, Ren. The First Order doesn’t serve you, or your pathetic little whims. If this map is so important, use the Force! That’s what you’re here for, if I’m not mistaken. All I’ve seen you do is prowl around _my_ ship in your ridiculous mask scaring the troopers.”

 

“That’s not how the Force works!” Ren had bellowed, causing the bridge crew who weren’t already staring at them to start. “You are about as Force sensitive as a loaf of instabread.” He had then swept off in a cloud of insolence and fury, leaving Hux to get on with his job.

 

Now, sitting in his bed with the screams of a thousand dead souls thrumming behind his eyes, Hux wonders whether Ren had been quite right.

It takes two weeks after the destruction of Starkiller before Ren is summoned by Snoke again. Hux is still, he presumes, in disgrace, though he has received a single comm instruction to oversee the rebuilding of the First Order. For the first time in his life, he feels uncomfortable under this order, though he knows he should be grateful he hasn’t already been executed. What has the First Order achieved, really, under Snoke’s totalitarian command? They control only four more systems than they had in Hux’s father’s day, back when Snoke had been a significant ally but no more. If anything, Hux is realising with doomed trepidation, the destruction of the Hosnian system has gained them no more than the renewed hate of the New Republic.

 

Hux is not a nice man, nor a kind one, but he is a clever one.

 

They are lying in Ren’s bed when the other man receives the command to visit Snoke. Bickering lazily about which holodrama to watch on Hux’s night off, the invitation comes as a rude interruption. Hux rolls onto one elbow to watch Kylo getting ready. It’s one of Hux’s few indulgences, watching him pull on robes like it’s an art form, right under holodramas and Corellian brandy.

 

“I don’t see why he has to message you. Can’t he just,” Hux waves a hand lazily in Kylo’s general vicinity, “Force message it to you or something?”

 

“That’s not how the Force works,” Kylo rolls his eyes, though the undercurrent of his voice is fond. _How does the Force work, then?_ Hux wants to ask. _Why can I feel your nightmares and hear their screams?_ But he doesn’t, not wanting to investigate this odd matter of circumstance just yet. Kylo turns to leave, maskless. It seems as though the presence of the scar diminishes the need for a mask in Kylo’s ever eccentric logic. Before leaving, however, he stalks back to the bed and brushes a sweaty strand of hair out of Hux’s eyes and drops down to place a gentle kiss on his forehead. Hux is left, stunned, on the bed, too content to think about facing the horrors of sleep just yet.

 

When Ren returns, Hux is in the middle of a battle with a giant, which is a horrific combination of Han Solo and Brendol Hux, mashed together like a clumsy child’s toy with big black stitches. The creature lunges while all around him, the people of the Hosnian system cheer for his blood. He swipes at the creature with his lightsaber, only to see it crumble into a thousand matchsticks. He deserves this, some deep dark part of him understands, as he looks up, helpless, at the creature about to crush him underfoot.

 

A gentle hand shakes him awake, and he blinks up at Ren’s dark eyes. His posture is hunched, a contrary image to the relaxed figure that left his quarters five hours ago. Ren’s features are clenched, eyes dark and at odds with Hux’s gentle awakening. They stare at each other for a few seconds until Ren lets out a shaky sigh, some of his tension seeming to dissipate. He pulls the cowl over his head in silence, stripping until he is left in black leggings. Hux watches quietly, still recovering from the latest manifestation of his guilt.

 

“Supreme Leader is…displeased.”

 

And isn’t that the understatement of the century, Hux thinks, as he takes in the set of fresh wounds covering Kylo’s torso, many most likely self inflicted. It’s there, right next to ‘all it takes to destroy a system is the pushing of a button’.

He sits down on the bed, and Hux retrieves a damp cloth from the bathroom, dabbing antiseptic onto the cuts. Kylo winces, and then tries to smooth his features.

 

“You are allowed to feel pain, Ren. Some of these look bad.”

 

Another understatement. Ren’s back, usually a galaxy of collective moles and freckles, is raw and red under Hux’s hands.

 

“Pain is necessary to connect with the Dark Side. Pain provides a channel for the Force. Besides, I deserved it. I failed Supreme Leader.”

 

Hux hides his eyeroll in the Kylo’s hair. He wants to tell him that he didn’t fail, that he actually wouldn’t mind if Kylo wasn’t constantly in pain, thank you. He wonders if the Light Side requires this sort of damage. But then, Ren is always telling him that the Light Side is for the weak. _But an untrained scavenger beat him using the Light_. His internal monologue holds a chorus of whispers under it. Kylo is glaring at him now, having evidently caught wind of Hux’s thoughts as he is sometimes able to do.

 

“Hux, true power lies in the Dark Side. The First Order and the Dark Side, their irrevocably linked. They need each other to fix the galaxy,” Kylo frowns. This is one of Snoke’s favourite lines, Hux knows. He holds up a hand in surrender while the other continues smoothing antiseptic into a particularly unpleasant gash on Ren’s side, just above the blaster wound from the Wookie Hux sees occasionally.

 

“You’re the Force expert, Ren.”

 

They continue in silence for a few more minutes. Ren obviously wants to say something, and Hux knows from experience that he often has to work up to it. Hux has always had a natural affinity for words, for persuasion. In another universe, he could have been a Senator, he thinks. Perhaps even a diplomat. The thought is darkly humorous – him, with the blood of thousands on his hands, a champion of peace.

 

“I could talk to Supreme Leader about your dreams.”

 

Hux freezes, hoping for a blind second that Ren is joking. Ren seems to have sensed his panic, and Hux resumes his dabbing, trying to feign calm though his heart seems to have forgotten what a normal pace is.

 

“You will do nothing of the sort, Ren.”

 

The thought of Snoke being privy to his thoughts, to his uncertainties about the First Order’s future, is nothing short of terrifying. Kylo has turned to face him, and look almost hurt, a ridiculous emotion on the face of the literal embodiment of darkness. Hux stills momentarily, enough for Kylo to swiftly remove the blood soaked towel and antiseptic cream. He takes Hux’s left hand, covered in Kylo’s drying blood, and traces the lines there.

 

“I can help, Hux. I know you feel guilt, but with Supreme Leader’s guidance, I can help you stop it. Together, we can lead the First Order to its rightful place”.

Hux yanks back his hands and heads to the fresher, watching the blood run down the sink.

 

“So you and Snoke will make me an emotionless robot, is that it?” He knows Kylo is trying to help in his own weird way. It strikes him later how odd it is that he should be defending emotions, considering his place as champion of a program that aims to replace feelings with loyalty to the First Order.

 

Ren is angry now, Hux can feel it in his mind like a continual thud.

 

“So you want to keep having those dreams, then? Don’t you want to know why they’re happening?”

 

“They’re happening because of you, Ren!” Hux shouts, surprising himself. Slightly quieter, he adds, “you must be projecting or something, because I’ve practically been hearing your thoughts since Starkiller.”

 

Kylo frowns, anger there but lessened slightly. “No, there’s no way. I haven’t accidentally projected since I was a kid.” He thinks for a few more seconds, before looking up at Hux, still in the fresher, in excitement. “This is all the more reason to tell Supreme Leader. It might be something I’ve read about in old manuscripts. Sometimes, very powerful Force users could trigger Force sensitivity in individuals who are receptive to it. It’s a kind of Force bond, I suppose, but it’s really rare. In fact, for Dark side users it’s generally only triggered by…” Kylo trails off. Hux watches him expectantly, knowing he won’t like the answer.

 

“hate.” He finishes. “It used to be that some Dark masters could accidentally trigger Force sensitivity in their enemies. It was one of the things Sith lords used to train against.”

 

“And what about the Light Side? What causes it there?” Hux asks, suspecting he’ll like this answer even less.

 

Kylo meets his eyes for a few seconds before staring down at his clenched fists.

 

“Intense feelings of affection. Love,” he pauses, taking a shaky breath. “Jedi,” he spits the word as if it tastes bad. Perhaps it does. “There are stories of Jedi in the ancient times who could trigger Force sensitivity in their partners through a similar sort of bond. It was revered – encouraged. It was thought to increase the chance of having Force sensitive children. Lu- my previous master told me once that it hadn’t happened it thousands of years. Many people assume it’s just an old story.”

 

Hux needs a few moments for that to fully sink in. So he and Ren have some sort of Force bond, then, and what’s more, it’s definitely not a Dark Side bond. No matter what he and Ren have, it’s definitely not a hate strong enough to trigger the sort of power Ren has explained.

 

“Well, you definitely can’t tell Snoke then.” Kylo already looks fit to argue, and Hux holds up a hand to silence him.

 

“I’m already likely facing some sort of punishment for Starkiller. We both know Snoke doesn’t exactly take prisoners. If he finds out I’ve triggered some sort of Light Side awakening in you,” Kylo hisses and Hux gives him a pointed look, “he’ll kill me. We both know he will. Or, in reality, he’ll make you kill me. Sever the bond.”

 

Conflict runs rampant over Kylo’s features, and Hux doesn’t have the energy to argue anymore. “Please. Kylo.” Hux’s outward use of his title is rare, and he wields it like an affectionate, disarming nickname.

 

They both climb into bed, parallel lines who never quite meet.

 

When Hux wakes up, Ren is gone but there is a glass of blue milk on the floor next to him heated to the exact right temperature and accompanied by a note that reads ‘ _Training with Supreme Leader today’_ in his familiar chicken scratch. Honestly, Hux had expected the Master of the Knights of Ren to have better handwriting. He stretches and gets dressed, his clothes folded in a neat pile on Ren’s solitary chair. In the back of his mind, he replays last night’s dream in unsettling clarity. He had been dressed in white robes, holding a purple lightsaber instead of Ren’s usual red. The same assortment of faces appeared before him, and he battled every one. Suddenly, the scene shifted so he was in arena, the Hosnians once again cheering for his blood.

 

His opponent was Ren, clad in his black robes. This wasn’t his Ren though. His Ren has dark brown eyes, whereas this one’s eyes were pure black. Hux had seen a collection of golden strings tied to Ren’s wrists and legs, and tried to call out to him. The other man simply attacked in jerky, vicious movemenst. Even with the strange strings, he was still a powerful fighter, Hux barely able to block his blows. He tripped over the something, landing on his back while Ren loomed over him, the crowd’s cheering getting louder and louder like a pack of swarming bees. Before Ren brought down his lightsaber over his neck, Hux had realised what the strings were. Looming above the arena was Snoke, massive and powerful, one gnarled hand holding a cross to which the strings were tied, controlling Kylo’s every move. He had tried to cry out, but Kylo’s dark eyes remained unmoved as he brought the saber down on Hux.

 

The dream had been especially horrifying, and he has been unable to shake off the image of Snoke controlling Kylo since he woke. He finds himself distracted during the day, understandable as Snoke has him overseeing the project to find an appropriate planet to land the Finalizer and reconvene with their allies. He has been looking over potential sites for four hours, and decides to do some investigation into an area he has been puzzling over since the destruction of the Hosnian system.

 

Of course, when FN-2187 escaped with Poe Dameron, he had done thorough research of the individual in question. No prior records of non-conformity. In fact, he had been one of Phasma’s most promising troopers. He had puzzled over it for hours at the time. It had been a frankly upsetting incident, proof that the stormtrooper program was not infallible. In fact, in the wake of Starkiller, eight troopers had stolen TIE fighters in the midst of the chaos and defected.

 

Hux had thought them weak, now he thinks that maybe they were lucky.

 

Apparently this trooper was calling himself ‘Finn’ now. A blurry holo of him with an arm wrapped around Dameron had emerged. There were murmurs of him being at the centre of the Resistance, one of Organa’s particular favourites. Hux remembers that he had been a part of Ren’s defeat on Starkiller. Some said that he was Force sensitive. Once, Hux had scoffed at the rumours. A Force sensitive stormtrooper? The idea no longer seemed preposterous.

 

How much light did someone have to have inside them to shake of a lifetime’s worth of programming? What sort of goodness did this Finn have to have inside him to risk his own life to save a prisoner he’d never met before? After he’d escaped, Phasma had informed Hux of the incident on Jakku, his refusal to fire on the villagers.

 

 _How can he feel guilty when he never did anyone harm?_ Hux thinks. _How did he stop?_ The answer is clear in Hux’s mind, uneasy and uncomfortable.

 

The Hosnian whispers urge him on.

 

That night, he forgoes Ren’s room for his own, knows Ren will find him if he needs him.

 

He is sitting at his desk, scanning through a collection of accounting documents that need his signature, when there is a knock at his door. Ren is the only one who refuses to use the little keypad next door like a normal person, prefers instead to be invited inside like he’s some sort of space vampire. When Hux does let him in, he strides quickly towards the bedroom before collapsing heavily on Hux’s bed. Hux frowns at Kylo’s boots on his bed sheet and sighs before lowering to his knees to pull them off. Kylo appears to be in no state to look after Hux’s linen, so it seems he’ll have to do it himself.

 

Once the boots are off, Hux crawls up next to Kylo and gently rolls him until he’s lying on his side. He wraps an arm round his waist, allows himself the small pleasure of nuzzling into the soft hairs at the base of Kylo’s neck. They smell like sweat and Kylo’s usual earthy brand of musk that reminds Hux of the trees on his home planet for some absurd reason.

 

“You need a sanistream,” Hux murmurs into his hair.

 

“You need a sanistream,” Kylo retorts like the child he is.

 

“Fine. We’ll do it together then.”

 

Hux practically strips Kylo when they’re in the fresher, tosses both their clothes down the laundry chute before he can protest. One of the perks of being a General is the large showerhead on the back wall. Hux turns it on, inspecting Kylo’s back while he does so. There are no new marks, thankfully, and yesterdays seem to be healing well.

 

There have been times like this before, in Kylo’s training, where he returns barely able to speak. Usually, it’s when Snoke’s training has been focused on the mental, rather than the physical, elements of the Force. Hux swallows his anxiety at what that might mean and instead focuses on washing Ren with the gel that smells like the ocean (at least, that’s what it says on the bottle. It’s been years since Hux has been to a beach). It’s Kylo’s favourite though, and he allows Hux to work it through his hair. When they’re done, Hux forces him into a towel, because otherwise Kylo will collapse onto bed completely sopping, as Hux knows from experience.

 

When he judges him dry enough, they both climb back into their original position.

 

“Hux,” Kylo starts, before stopping. He sounds more like his usual self, and this doesn’t have the reassuring effect Hux expects it to.

 

“Hux, Supreme Leader…”

 

“He knows,” Hux finishes. Kylo shifts away so he can face him.

 

“He could tell I wasn’t telling him something. He forced it out of me Hux – the bond, the dreams. Everything.”

 

There was no apology, and Hux didn’t expect one. The puppet image held in his mind.

 

“So will you do it?”

 

“Do what?” Kylo asks confusedly. Hux sighs at having to spell it out.

 

“Will you kill me? Or will he?”

 

“I don’t know.” Hux appreciates his bluntness. “He wasn’t exactly forthcoming. I think he might still want to use it – these bonds, they’re very powerful.”

 

 _So naïve, for such a dark creature_.

 

“It’s a Light bond, Ren.”

 

“Life would be so much easier if I still hated you.”

 

Kylo worms his way into Hux’s chest, presses his head against his sternum and Hux considers his options. He’s never been one to play it safe, had been the first to suggest a weapon capable of eradicating whole galaxies in the blink of an eye, for christ’s sake. So he takes a breath, and shows Kylo instead of telling him.

 

 _They take one of the TIE fighters from the lower decks of the Finalizer, where they’re less likely to be noticed missing. Hux disables the tracking device, and they fly to the Outer Rim where they swap ships and change clothes. From there, they run to a New Republic planet and request an audience with General Leia Organa as First Order defectors. In exchange for their lives, they provide essential information regarding the First Order and their allies and Snoke._ The plan gets a little blurry here. _Hux sees himself with long hair and a beard in some small apartment in a crowded city, sees Kylo coming through the door in grey robes with a new saber, though he can’t tell what colour it is. He sees them as smugglers in an old ship, hunting down artifacts. He even sees them with the Resistance, standing next to Leia Organa…_

“Hux! HUX! Stop showing me this- this treason!”

 

Hux reels back at Kylo’s sputtering. His eyes are dark with anger and confusion. For once, Hux finds himself lost for words.

 

“I-I thought it was on the table. You said yourself you don’t know if Snoke is going to kill me. You said our bond was a result of the _Light Side, Kylo_. Surely that means something?”

 

“So you’re suggesting treason? You _are_ the First Order Hux, and I am the Dark Side. Do you really think you’re the only one who gets nightmares? You think that blowing up a few worthless planets makes it okay to abandon everything you know?”

 

 _To abandon me?_ Is left unsaid. Hux tugs his hair in frustration.

 

“Every night, I hear the voices of an entire system begging me for mercy, Kylo. _Every night._ I have no training, I have nothing. How am I supposed to cope with that? How am I supposed to cope with the fact that Snoke is putting his meddling with the Force ahead of the purpose of the First Order?!”

 

“What, so you want to run away?” Kylo asks, on the border between incredulous and sneering.

 

“I want us to run away together,” Hux realises how childish he sounds, how terribly hopeful. “Away from Snoke, away from everything.”

 

“You’d have me run back into the arms of my mother, away from my Master?” Ren scoffs and Hux shivers, the word Master stuck on loop in his head.

 

“He’s not helping you become more powerful, he’s using your power for his own benefit. You have to know that. You’re nothing more than his puppet.”

 

Kylo jumps out of bed, ripping the sheet off, leaving Hux exposed.

 

“I am _not_ his puppet. I am the Master of the Knights of Ren and it would do you well to remember that, General. Did you really think this silly – attachment to you could be more important than that?”

 

Hux can sense the lie in Kylo’s voice, but the words cut all the same. Around his room, everything is floating, and he can feel an almost electric current in the air. He can feel the Force like a chokehold around his throat, knows it’s Ren.

 

He is released suddenly, and everything returns to its rightful spot with a bang. Kylo is breathing heavily, eyes wild and wounded, still naked.

 

Hux lets out a shaky laugh.

 

“So what is it now, Ren? Are you going to run to your Master? Have him punish the General?” the cruelty that slides into his voice is directed at himself as well, at his stupidity.

 

“You have twenty four hours. You can either decide to join me in training with the Supreme Leader, or you can try to escape.”

 

They stare at eachother in silence. Ren is still doing him favours, and Hux hates him for it, hates him so much that he can’t even remember what hate feels like.

 

“Take my coat,” Hux instructs, and Kylo does, wrapping it round himself and pulling on his boots. At the door, Kylo pauses and looks at Hux.

 

“I loved you, Hux.”

 

“You still do.”

 

In the early hours of the morning, General Hux of the First Order steals one of his own TIE fighters and disables the tracker. Eight hours later, when the disappearance of both the TIE fighter and the General are correlated, no one can get a lock on the missing ship. Kylo Ren is off ship on some mission on the Outer Rim. He cannot be informed of the news until he returns. No-one knows quite how, or why the General escaped. The TIE fighters are dangerous to fly without a co-pilot. Some, however, are unsurprised.

 

A TIE fighter lands on a downtrodden space station bordering the line between First Order and New Republic territory. A lone figure emerges dresses in plain black clothes. His only distinguishing feature is a shock of bright red hair. He purchases a dark brown leather jacket from a market stall vendor, and a plain circular locket designed to hold a single holo image. In it is the image of a pale man with dark eyes and hair sleeping. He looks peaceful, and his face is covered in a collection of moles and one long scar. The figure buys a ticket to the New Republic centre. He has a commanding sort of presence that makes some of the other passengers a little uneasy.

 

Upon arriving at the New Republic, he makes his way to the office of General Leia Organa, leader of the Resistance. He announces his presence to the receptionist as “the former General Hux of the First Order. I request an immediate meeting with General Organa. I have been informed she is in the Republic today”. The receptionist recognises him from the video, the speech just before the Hosnian system was destroyed. She fetches the General, who is part way through a pile of paperwork and has paused to hold a picture of her and her late partner, Han Solo. Han is holding a small boy with dark hair above his head while Leia laughs. “General?” Leia looks up. “There’s a man here to see you. He says- He says he’s the former General Hux of the First Order.” Leia puts down the frame and sighs. Today is going to be a long day.

 

When Hux is lead into the General’s small office, the first thing he notice is the picture on her desk, laid down instead of propped up. He knows it’s Ren, recognises the eyes the same colour as his new jacket.

 

General Organa of the Resistance and former General Hux of the First Order size eachother up. Hux thinks he knows where Kylo got his eyes. Leia thinks this man looks just like Ben’s type.

 

“So, General Hux. You are defecting from the First Order?”

 

Hux nods.

 

“May I ask why?”

Hux wonders if she’s Force sensitive, and decides to risk it, projects images of the Hosnian system, the dreams, Snoke, Kylo’s back, the thin golden piece of energy he can feel connecting him and Kylo even here. She nods, once, eyes full of pain.

 

“Why do you think we should help you?”

 

Hux has thought the words a thousand times, tried to express how he thinks, with their help, he can return Kylo Ren, or Ben Solo, to the light. The words fail to come, however.

 

Instead, he opens the locket, allows the most precious image he owns to spill on to the General’s desk.

 

 _Love_ he thinks.

 

 _Love_ , she agrees.

 

 

 

 

**Author's Note:**

> feel free to come yell at me at orgvnas.tumblr.com


End file.
